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NOTE:  This poem is best viewed on a desktop device.  If you are using a mobile device, please view Rob's poem on this PDF.

Rob Colgate

Gay Wasteland

​I drew the boundaries                                      of a gay wasteland
then shared the wasteland                  with a drowning boy              
 
spent eight hours there                        don’t remember much
except for                                                all of it
 
the image of my glass filled                            with sparkling water
and the boy hiding                                            at the bottom of it
 
bleaching tunnels for people                          to drive through
oh sunshine courtesan                          you’ll never be            clear
 
and the flash photo of us                      with the straws            and the panic
and the waiting to panic                       until I was home                     alone
 
all of the stomachs                                 were moving in circles
all of my trees                              turned into trees        
 
that I didn’t know                                   how to name             
for their deadness                       or their color   or their virility            
 
briefly I was                 a cloud               raining sweet peroxide
over that dead                              dead lagoon
 
and yes sweet lakeshore                        I still adore you
but here I am staring                                         at another boy
 
who is staring                               at another boy            and that boy is
pink                                                            where i try to be white
 
just tell me how much                                       for tickets to the show
for the archived love                   letters
 
first you see a light                                  then you take it away
and then what                               a field of absence
 
and then the winter                                apartment
and then                                         the summer apartment

Biography

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Rob Colgate (he/him/his) is a poet from Evanston, Illinois. He holds a degree in psychology from Yale University and has studied poetry at the Iowa Writers' Workshop. He is currently pursuing his MFA with the New Writers Project at UT Austin. His first chapbook, So Dark the Gap, was published by Tammy in March 2020 and is available online and in select bookstores. You can find him at robcolgate.com, on Twitter @YoungAdultRebel, and on Instagram @swing.sets.
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ISSN 2639-426X
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